Taketori Monogatari
by SuspiciousCook
Summary: In this tale, a man intervenes when he would normally remain absent. Because of this intervention, a man lived. Since that man lived, another man died. As a consequence of that man's death, many actors, old and new, have different places on the stage of life. AU, pairings undecided.
1. A Very Short Prologue

Taketori Monogatari Chapter 1: A Very Short Prologue

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**Disclaimer:** Blah blah don't own Naruto blah blah all rights to their respective owners blah.

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**Unknown Location, Unknown Time:**

A man was sitting in an empty white space, meditating.

Well, he wasn't so much _sitting_ as he was simply _existing._ He was just kind of being there. This white space wasn't even really a place; it was a _plane,_ a realm between the worlds of life, death, dreams and waking. With his mind, he was reaching out and feeling the the natural forces of the world. Push and pull, birth and rebirth, yin and yang. He felt these existential forces, these dualities that slowly exploded outward and imploded inward, as if he witnessing a supernova occur in slow motion, only for it to collapse under the weight of its own power and succumb to the gravitational pull of the resulting black hole. These forces were without light, sound, or heat, yet they felt as natural as the beating of one's own heart.

It was as if the world itself were alive.

It was in this realm that the man was searching. For what, you might ask? He was looking for a means to end a painful cycle of tragedy that the world had faced for countless ages; an endless chain of calamity and pain that shaped and shattered the world each time it repeated.

A curse of hatred and despair.

The key to stopping such unspeakable misfortune lied in two souls, two lives that resurfaced throughout history, always growing alongside one another only to inevitably rage against each other in a cataclysmic battle. The man projected himself outwards, releasing pulses of his own existence and observing the tides of fate to determine if those waves of power had uncovered any trace of the two destined souls.

He had been doing this for ages, and he would continue to do so until he could find what he was searching for. He had seen many strange things in the tides if fate, some from the past and many from a time yet to come.

He had seen the moon look down upon the world with a malicious and envious gaze.

He looked on in sadness as a family tore itself apart out of conflicting ambitions.

He watched in horror as the teachings of a sage were violated and transformed into weapons.

He bore witness to brothers waging wars against each other and saw the many wars to come.

He saw beasts being ripped apart and sealed in the name of power.

He gazed in awe as death itself touched down onto the mortal plane to tear the world asunder.

He made out faint traces of men who were not who they were and red clouds sailing across a black sky.

He was overcome with a wave of nostalgia as six paths headed in one direction, merging into one road.

He looked upon an entire world that should not have been but was, and was shocked to realize that it was-

**_There!_** There it was, a bright flash that interrupted his meditation. Like a sonar, it let out a soft pinging sound accompanied by a small light. The man had foumd exactly what he had been searching for. He knew this presence. He recognized this soul by heart. Even with this small glimpse, the man knew who and what this was. He spoke a single word, one that connected the soul to the tragedy of the past and the conflict of the future...

"Asura."

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**Konohagakure, Hi no Kuni. Thirteen years before the rampage of the Kyuubi (13 BNT):**

The shinobi of the hidden village, acting as its military force, were at war with nearly every other ninja village in the Five Great Shinobi Nations. Their primary opponent: Iwagakaure, the village hidden in the stone. Iwa had initially sent large military squadrons through Kusagakure, a minor nation, to lay siege to Konohagakure and various vital locations in the Land of Fire for the sake of protecting the interests of Iwagakure and the Land of Stone. There were also a few minor skirmishes between the forces of Konohagakure and Kumogakure, but those did not hold as much significance.

Anyway, our story begins on the grounds of Naka Shrine, one of the village's more famous historic locations. The shrine was revered by the Uchiha clan and was also venerated by the Senju clan before the tragic decline of the proud lineage. Our focus is one Fujiwara Hiroto. For readers from a Western culture, he would be referred to as Hiroto Fujiwara.

Hiroto was a nice guy. He was in his mid-thirties and had never married, but that would not be a surprise. After all, his job was not glamorous, nor did it pay highly. You see, Hiroto was the groundskeeper of the Naka Shrine. Every day, he would wake up, get dressed for work and head down to the shrine to make sure it was nice and clean. His job wasn't too exciting, but as long as he got a weekly salary, he wouldn't complain.

Good old Hiroto had finally finished up the day's work. He was strolling back to his cozy, single bedroom apartment to wind down after a long day when he decided to enjoy the scenery of Konoha. He gazed longingly at the beautiful sunset that dyed the sky a magnificent orange and watched as the shadows cast by clouds danced across the faces of the Hokage Monument. He looked at each face and tried to recollect the name and history behind each one. On the far right was the current Hokage, the Yondaime, Namikaze Minato. He was gaining a name for himself after creating some sort of ninjutsu that let him jump around the battlefield in the blink of an eye. Many people believed that this was the same jutsu used by the Nidaime, Senju Tobirama. Let's see...next was the Sandaime, Sarutobi Hiruzen. The old coot was still alive and kicking, if Hiroto remembered correctly. He was known as "The Professor" and was rumored to have mastered over a thousand different jutsu.

_'Pfft. Damn ninja and their tall tales.'_

They always had to exaggerate everything. The only rumor more ridiculous than that of the "Thousand Jutsu Ninja Professor" (he stifled a laugh at the thought of how absurd it sounded) had to be the one about the man who could grow trees with chakra. Hell, a few people even thought all the trees around Konoha were grown by the guy!

"Tch. Ninja are so full of shi-" Hiroto's statement was cut short by what he recognized as one of the most fearsome sounds an adult male could ever hear: the cacaphonous wailing of a baby. Hiroto glanced around cautiously and beheld a truly terrifying sight. It was a baby, swaddled in cloth and placed in a cradle in the side of the road. Beside the cradle was a sword, likely a nodachi (Hiroto wasn't very wise when it came to swords; he had little use for the things.) with a small paper tag tied to the sheath.

Now, you had to look at this situation from Hiroto's perspective. Children are terribly expensive to raise, especially babies. Babies are far worse than any other age group simply because all they did was eat, shit and cry. Hiroto preferred his life to be peaceful and quiet.

Babies were neither of those.

Then again, his daily life was pretty boring...and that sword did look pretty nice.

"Ah, fine. I'll take the whiny meatsack." Hiroto announced with an air of finality. He approached the baby, abandoning his caution in favor of curiosity. Leaning over, he examined the cradle and then the sword next to it. He bent down on one knee and took the paper tage that was tied to the jet black sheath in one hand, inspecting it and in a somewhat pensive manner. The only thing unique about the tag were the two Kanji characters written on it.

"Taketori, huh? Well kid, I might have a name for you after all. What's the worst that could happen?"


	2. Anniversary Box Set

Taketori Monogatari Chapter 2: Anniversary Box Set

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**Dislcaimer: **Blah blah don't own Naruto blah blah all rights to respective owners blah.

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"Talking"

_'ThInking'_

_"Emphasis" _**  
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**"Demon or Powerful Being speaking"**

**[Music Recommendation]**

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A/N: Please review! I need to know if anything needs to be addressed! Keep flames to yourself!

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**Credit and thanks to _Malluchan_ for editing this!**

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**Konohagakure, Twelve years after the Kyuubi's attack on Konoha (12 ANT):**

To the casual observer, this day was a good one for the denizens of Konoha. The sun was shining brightly, the insects sat in the grass, humming their various tunes, and even the birds were perched in the trees and singing sweet melodies. If an average citizen were to try and describe the setting, they would probably use words like "peaceful" or "beautiful." Unfortunately, there was one person in Konoha who was definitely not enjoying the pleasant mood. In fact, today was a sad day, if not an absolute horror, for that individual. Who was that person? The answer is simple.

Uzumaki Naruto.

He was a little tyke of no more than eleven or twelve years of age, dressed in a bright orange and blue jumpsuit. He had a few other clothes, though they tended to be of relatively poor quality. Clothes aside, Naruto was having a really shitty day. He had failed the Academy Graduation Exam for the second time in a row, despite all the time and effort he put into it. He could still remember the event with great clarity, as it had been etched into his memory by sadness and a bit of shame.

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**Shinobi Academy, Hours earlier:**

Naruto was struggling to remain in his desk, desperately wanting to leave the classroom and escape the judgemental gazes of his instructors and classmates as soon as possible. He had no doubt that he had failed the Graduation Exam yet again, despite spending the entire semester trying to create a feasible Bunshin. Mizuki, one of the instructors of the class, was announcing the list of who had passed or failed. As he approached Naruto's place on the list, the boy snapped back to reality, now paying absolute attention to what he was saying.

"Sugihara Seiryu,_ pass."_

"Torisei Mochihito,_ fail."_

"Uzumaki Naruto,_ fail."_

The moment he heard those words, every last bit of hope that the young jinchuuriki had was completelycrushed. The boy could practically feel the world collapsing around him as he realised that he had lost yet another chance at becoming a great shinobi, if not Hokage..

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**Konoha, Present time:**

'Stupid test! It's not my fault I can't make a freaking bunshin! That test such a load of crap, anyway! They don't even teach us half the stuff we're getting quizzed on! Stupid academy, stupid teachers, stupid tests, stupid-'

Naruto's reminiscence was interrupted by the smell of alcohol, which was especially offensive to his hyper-sensitive sense of smell. While smells like these were not normally much of a nuisance to him, Naruto dealt with this particular odor of booze every single time he walked to and from the Academy.

"Huh? What's that? It smells like..._ugh!_ It's that sake stuff again! Where the heck does it keep coming from?!"

Having to suffer a horrible stench every day for years in a row can really get on a person's nerves. Facing an event that utterly crushed your hopes was also debilitating. When you combine these two factors, you can get a human riled up enough to stray from the safe and boring pattern of an established routine. Well, either that or you could be Konoha's number one hyperactive, unpredictable ninja. Due to any possible combination of these factors, Naruto finally decided that today he would do what he did best.

He would deviate from the norm. More importantly, he would figure out where that overwhelming aroma of rice wine always came from. It wasn't as if there was a liquor store nearby- the closest one was at least four blocks away...

Naruto began to follow the scent of the sake through the many decrepit lots and narrows that riddled the section of the village that he dwelled in. He concluded his hunt through the streets after a few minutes, the path of his search having taken him to an empty alley that was nestled between two large, decrepit buildings. The walls of the structures were covered with rust, having clearly been left to waste away many years ago, exposed to the ravages of time and weather. What truly intrigued Naruto was the alleyway itself; it felt suspiciously different from its surroundings. Naruto was certainly no chakra sensor, but he could definitely feel a sense of _wrongness_ emanating from the alleyway.

"The heck is this?! It feels all weird...I get it! This is some kinda ninja secret!" Naruto exclaimed.

'I bet there's a super-special ninja treasure stashed around here, like some ultra-powerful jutsu! I'm gonna find it and make everyone see that I'm the number one ninja in the village, dattebayo!'

Naruto began to search for whatever 'secret' may have been stealthily concealed in the alley. But upon taking his steps forward, he glimpsed a shimmer in the air.

"The heck is going on?!" the young demon container shouted, "What kinda trick is this? A jutsu?"

When he reached out to touch the oddity, it started to undulate kept shaking his hand around in the space before hi, as if he were trying to swat away a swarm of insects, first uncertainly, then with increased intensity. This only served to disturb the visual effect even further, causing it to pulse and quake violently.

Then it simply stopped.

The sight that Naruto witnessed next was a very curious one indeed. The entire alley began to fade away, its emptiness slowly vanishing to reveal something entirely different beneath. The disappearance of the alley exposed a simple, open doorway with a wooden frame. Around it were the walls of an entirely new building that lacked the rust, corrosion and untidiness of the forsaken structures he had seen upon his arrival. From beyond the doorway came the sounds of gentle murmurs and clinking glass, with the occasional burst of raucous laughter. It was then that Naruto realized where the alcohlic smell had led him: a bar. However, this was not any ordinary bar.

It was _the Jounin Bar._

You see, the Jounin Bar was a very special bar, as it catered only to Konoha's Jounin and shinobi elite. This place was shrouded in mystery, wrapped in secrecy, masked with conspiracy and gently sprinkled with intrigue. There were many theories on how to reach the elusive establishment, and those theories were as wild as they were numerous. Some shinobi speculated that the door to the bar was disguised as the Memorial Stone. Still others held the theory that the entrance was a mystic portal behind the sun of Maito Guy's infamous Sunset of Youth genjutsu. One of the most popular theories was that map of Konoha, along with the location of the bar and Hokage's secret Kinjutsu Index, was tattooed to the true face of the infamous copy-nin, Hatake Kakashi.

Said infamous copy-nin was walking out of the bar with his nose in his usual copy of Icha-Icha Paradise while followed by a shinobi clad in a Konoha regulation flak jacket with short but messy hair of a dull orange color that could easily be mistaken for brown.

"Come on, Kakashi-senpai!" the jacket-wearing ninja asked, "Will you?"

"No." Kakashi gave a short but bored response. His attention was clearly focused on his little book, and not the man by him.

"You can do it at least one more time, right?" the other one asked.

Only silence from Kakashi.

"Please?"

Once again, Kakashi gave no reply.

"I know what I'm asking for isn't easy, but you'll have that whole week off, anyway! Think of it as a mission! I'll even pay you!"

"Huh? Did you say something?"

"Kakashi, I _really_ need your help. I'll even give you a cut of the profits when the cash starts rolling in. What do you say?"

Kakashi again declined to answer.

"I really hate you sometimes, you know that? The amount of hate I have for you right now would make Gamabunta seem small by comparison. There is so much hate. So. Much. _Hate."_

"Hm? When did you get here, Taketori?"

Taketori resigned himself to rub his temples in exasperation, frustrated at his uncompromising senior. "Okay...I didn't want to have to do this, but you've forced my hand, Kakashi. If you take care of them while I'm gone, I'll buy you the Icha-Icha Anniversary Box Set."

Kakashi froze on the spot. "The Anniversary Box Set?! I have heard the old legends, but...is it really true?

"Indeed, Kakashi-senpai. Both Icha-Icha Paradise and Icha-Icha Violence, along with a new mini-trilogy of Icha-Icha Emotion, Dynamic and Install. It's so exclusive, you have to pre-order it. I reserved a copy last month as a means of_...persuading_ you to see things my way when a problem arises."

"Couldn't I just order a copy myself?"

"Nope. The reservation period ended fifteen days ago."

At that revelation, Kakashi visibly deflated. He just gained hope in refreshing his life with the glory of Icha-Icha, only to have that hope snatched from his hands and smashed to pieces.

"Your tardiness will be the death of you one of these days, Kakashi-senpai."

"Maa...and you were going to buy me one?" A ray of hope shone through the darkness of Kakashi's soul. Perhaps Kami would take pity on him?

"Well, only if you take care of the-"

"Deal." Kakashi declared without hesitation. It seemed there was hope for humanity in this world after all.

"Alright, but I won't have it until I get back from the mission. Don't get mad if it takes awhile to get-"

"It's worth the wait," Kakashi interrupted, "Time is nothing compared to the writings of Jiraiya-sama."

"You really are messed up, aren't you? Feh, it doesn't matter. By the way, who's the kid? He's been staring at us for the last, I dunno, five minutes?" Taketori said as he directed his compatriot's attention to Naruto, who had been staring at them for the last few minutes while frozen in a combination of trepidation and awe.

The boy finally spoke up, "How the heck did you do that?! Is that some kinda ninjutsu? You gotta tell me!"

Kakashi chuckled beneath his mask at the youngster's exuberance. It was always good to see such a display of childish innocence.

Taketori stepped forward and replied, "Yeah, that was a genjutsu, kid. I'm surprised, not many civilians notice that sort of thing."

"Hey!" Naruto shouted indignantly, "I'm a ninja, and you'd better remember it! I'm gonna be the Hokage one day, dattebayo!"

"A ninja, huh? What rank are you? Genin? Chunin? If you could see through that genjutsu, you've got to be a decent genin at the very least."

Naruto lost his former cheer at that question. "I'm...not a ninja yet. I keep failing that stupid graduation test..."

Taketori seemed surprised by this. "Oh? That's odd. You saw through the genjutsu, so you had to at least be-" He cut himself off after taking another look at the child. _'Wait a minute. Orange tracksuit, blonde hair, whisker-things, loud voice...you've got to be kidding me.'_

"Hey, uh, you wouldn't happen to be Uzumaki Naruto, would you?"

"Yup, that's me! Uzumaki Naruto, soon-to-be world's greatest ninja, dattebayo!" Naruto cheerfully proclaimed.

Taketori shot a look at Kakashi that conveyed obvious confusion. "This is him, Kakashi-senpai?"

Kakashi nodded in affirmation, "Yes, that would be Uzumaki Naruto, Konoha's resident prankster and all-around troublemaker."

Taketori looked back at Naruto and _smiled._ This wasn't any ordinary smile, like that of your average happy fellow. No, this was the ferocious grin of a madman, and it made Kakashi begin to slowly back away.

"Taketori, just what are you planning?" The scheming nin's grin grew even wider response.

"Kakashi, you're telling me that this is the Uzumaki Naruto, the one that escapes the ANBU on an almost daily basis?"

"Yes..."

_'It really_ is _him! If he can dodge the ANBU, just imagine how well he'll do if_ _he does some training...'_

Taketori focused his full attention on Naruto. "Kid, how would you like me to train you to graduate from the Academy?"

Naruto's eyes grew wide with surprise. "Really?! Yes! Pleaseohpleaseohplease! Nobody's ever trained me before!"

Kakashi felt a shiver go down his spine.

"Alright, kid," Taketori said, "Meet me at Training Ground Three tomorrow afternoon. I'll show you how to be a proper ninja."

"Yeah! This gonna be so awesome!" Naruto shouted to the heavens.

_'This is going to be a disaster,'_ Kakashi thought.

"Soon, the ANBU will tremble with fear! Muahahaha!" Taketori exclaimed while ominous storm clouds gathered in the sky and lightning flashed dramatically

After a few moments, Naruto spoke up, "Uh...ninja-san?"

"The name's Taketori, kid."

"Taketori-sensei, I, uh...well..."

Taketori groaned in exasperation, "You don't know where Training Ground Three is, don't you?"

Naruto shook his head, confirming the nin's fears.

"Well, just meet me back here tomorrow afternoon, I guess."

"Awesome!" Naruto then began a hasty trek back to his apartment. "See you later, Taketori-sensei!"

Taketori looked to the orange figure retreating in the distance. Soon, all of Konoha would fear his mighty pupil. Kakashi, however, was glaring at the tokubetsu jonin with enough intensity to burn holes in the back of his head.

"I hate you, Taketori."

"Anniversary Box Set."

"All is forgiven."


End file.
